Good Girl, Bad Girl(58)

She nods.

“Did you look for her?”

“Yes.”

“Where did you go?”

Her mouth opens and closes. She swallows. She looks at her hands. “I went to Toby’s house. I thought Jodie might have gone there . . .”

“But you said she didn’t like him.”

“She sort of didn’t, but I knew she still did, you know.”

“Did you see Toby?”

She shrugs and mumbles. “He was with someone else.”

“Fuckboy,” whispers Brianna under her breath.

“Where would I find Toby Leith?” I ask.

“At the skate park. He’s there all the time,” says Brianna.

Olive raises her hand as though we’re in a classroom. “Did someone rape Jodie? Is that why . . . ?” She doesn’t finish.

“What makes you ask?”

She shakes her head, losing confidence.

Felicity visibly stiffens. “I’m not sure the girls need to know the details.”

“The police also found condoms in Jodie’s school locker,” I say.

“I knew it!” says Brianna, grinning wickedly. “You don’t get a guy like Toby unless you’re putting out.”

“Please don’t talk about Jodie like that,” says Felicity.

“I’m only telling the truth,” whines Brianna.

“I think you girls should leave.”

“Nooo,” complains Tasmin.

“It’s time the girls went home.”

Brianna tosses her hair. “Come on, Olive. This place gives me the creeps.” They’re in the hallway, but Brianna can’t resist a parting shot, this one directed at me. “People keep making Jodie out to be some sort of Disney princess, all pure and innocent. You should talk to her brother.”

“Why?”

Another laugh; another toss of her hair; and I feel like I’m fourteen again with braces on my teeth and a pimpled face that betrayed every humiliation like a Magic 8 Ball.





31




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CYRUS




* * *



The girls have gone by the time I get outside. I wonder how much of their provocative posturing and the sly nudges were designed to shock me. When I was their age, I found girls intimidating because they seemed to be so much more self-aware and confident, capable of destroying me with a single shrug or curl of a top lip or toss of their hair.

One girl in particular, Karen Heinz, terrorized me more than the rest. Most of my schoolmates felt sorry for me after what had happened to my family, but Karen took it upon herself to belittle and humiliate me at every opportunity, as though she resented my tragic fame. I wish I could put it down to hormones or a shitty home life or a period that lasted until A Levels, but Karen was simply a bitch and I hate the fact that I still hate her.

Retracing my steps to Silverdale Walk, I pass the footbridge and turn left at the fork, crossing the meadow and the tram tracks, before emerging at the edge of Forsyth Academy. The asphalt path is crumbling in places and partially covered in fallen leaves.

Ten minutes later, I reach Clifton—a slightly more upmarket area with neater gardens, newer cars, and fewer abandoned supermarket trolleys. Keeping the school grounds to my left, I follow Farnborough Road until I reach a sign for Clifton Skatepark. A dozen teenagers are riding the concrete ramps, curved walls, and jumps. I catch a whiff of something herbal in the air. One of them looks at me petulantly as he drags on a soggy spliff. Like the others, he’s wearing an unofficial “uniform”: baggy jeans, a sweatshirt, and a baseball cap.

I approach the nearest group. One girl. Four boys.

“I’m looking for Toby Leith.”

“And who are you?” asks the girl, trying to show her street cred by taking the lead.

A boy makes an oinking sound. The others laugh, but one glances over his shoulder and I know that Toby Leith must be nearby. A second group is racing BMX bikes on a series of parallel tracks that rise and fall over concrete jumps.

“Which one is he?” I ask.

The girl whistles. Decks are kicked into fists and bikes are propped on one foot. I pick out Toby because he’s helmet-less and hatless and cockier than the rest. Ignoring the signal, he rises on his pedals and drops almost vertically down a ramp, accelerating along the flat bottom and getting airborne as he takes each jump. When he reaches the far end, he rockets up a steep incline and spins in midair before landing with both wheels on the top of the ramp, fifty yards away.

“Can we talk?” I yell.

“You a reporter?”

“I’m a psychologist.”

“I don’t need a shrink.”

“I work with the police.”

“I already talked to the cops.”

“Then you know all the answers.” I look over the edge at the vertical drop. “It’s easier if you come to me.”

“I can hear you from here.”

“I hear Jodie was your girlfriend.”

“I don’t have a girlfriend.”

“Your ex then.”

Toby looks at me blankly. “Just because I finger-bang a girl at a party doesn’t mean we’re engaged.”